Tuesday, July 15, 2008

Today I got to see my kiddos! I especially missed them because I hadn’t seen them since Thursday. When I walked into the orphanage most of the kids were outside so we headed out there. Sadly Andrei wasn’t out there – he was upstairs sleeping once again. Later in the morning he stumbled out. It made me kind of sad, because he didn’t seem as excited to see me as usual. I don’t know if he was upset that I hadn’t been there for a few days or what. After a few minutes he warmed up to me and immediately grabbed my hand to play with him.

Outside my pink streak in my hair was immediately noticed. Sera called me over and looked at me and was like “why?” I told him that I felt like it. Obviously it wasn’t a good enough answer because he just shook his head and said “There is a reason you’ve done that. You aren’t telling me something. It is symbolism for something.” Whitney S. and I were cracking up. I kept telling him there was no symbolism, but he didn’t believe me. Then Whitney S. and I decided to play with him and ask him to guess why we did it. He never stated he didn’t like it, but he pretty much did with his facial language. Then when Florine saw my hair he was like “wow – rosi” (wow pink). I was loving the reactions. Dr. Pantezescu also came over and said it was beautiful and started playing with my hair. I couldn’t tell if she was being serious or just mocking me.

As were were playing outside Sera was being kind of a jerk. He started saying something to Florine and looked at me and started laughing. When I asked him what he said all he said was “men.” Then he kept talking to him in Romanian. I told him he was being rude. Romanians are so annoying sometimes.

When we went inside with the kids Andrei started throwing a fit and once again they put him in his crib. I was like “not again!” Every time he has cried in the past week they throw him in there for the rest of the morning. After he was in there a few minutes I asked Maria if he could get out. Luckily she said yes. I was so glad.

We got a new child in our room today. His name is Vali. It’s sad because you can tell he has been badly abused. Every time you raise your hand he cringes and cowers like you are going to hit him. Even when you are just going to touch him softly…it’s so sad. I cuddled him for a while. He just laid in my arms quite content. Later on though he got upset and flung a toy across the room. It seems like he is extremely passive aggressive. Sad.

In the room Andrei got a little annoyed this new little boy was taking my attention. He gets so protective of me. He was trying to hit the other little boy, and I kept telling him “nu” (no). He is so funny, because he gets this mean look on his face if he doesn’t like what another little kid is doing. If looks could kill man…wow.

Maria was so cute today. I just adore her. She has not wanted to play lately. She just wants to cuddle. Today once again she just flopped herself into my lap, and I cuddled her. She got the cutest little grin of satisfaction when I held her in my arms. She just needs love - like they all do.

When we left the orphanage Mindy and MacKenzie came in fuming. Sera is often in their room working with the babies and apparently he started going off about the church. He told them he has read The Book of Mormon, and he doesn’t believe it is true. I guess he had a bunch of stuff underlined that he didn’t agree with, but he wouldn’t even let them explain the reasoning behind certain things. The girls said he wouldn’t listen to one word they had to say, and at one point they said he said he shook The Book of Mormon and exclaimed “it’s bull s***.” The girls were both upset. I don’t blame them. Our religion is important to us, and when someone disrespects that it is huge. Sera can be a total jerk sometimes. I asked them if they told him to talk to the missionaries because they would best be able to answer any questions he had, and they said they had but he didn’t want to. It’s one thing to disagree, but when you are disrespectful that’s a whole new ball game. I told them it sounds like he just wants to Bible bash. Then I told them not to play into his game. In high school if my friends started saying rude things about my religion or started asking questions in a disrespectful way I would simply say “My religion is too important for me to argue about it. I know what is true. If you want to have a discussion about the church I am more than happy to talk to you, but if you are just going to be disrespectful I will not talk to you.” They usually shut up after I said that.

Outside we waited for Annie. She said Melissa and her can’t leave any earlier. We’re trying to find a solution so our time isn’t wasted and she can get home…we are going to brainstorm. While we were sitting out there waiting these Romanian guys started yelling from their window at us. They were like “What language do you speak? Where are you from?” We all ignored them, but of course they continued. Then they were like “I like your eyes. I like your smile,” and then they continued with a list of simple phrases they knew in English. Soooo obnoxious.

At the hospital Annie and I had a funny situation happen. The nurse showed us to a room that had two little disabled kids, and we went in and started holding them. Then Annie turned on some Michael Buble music and we started dancing with them. After playing with them for almost an hour all of a sudden a lady walked into the room and looked very confused. Apparently it was the mother for both of them. We told her we were sorry and left. She didn’t seemed bothered. She actually said “merci” (thank you). After all we had played with her kids and changed their diapers. Haha…Annie and I were cracking up. How random would that be if you left the hospital room for a few minutes, walk back into the room and see two girls that don’t speak your language holding and dancing with them – not to mention have their backpacks on your bed. Oh Romania.

After those kids I played with a little boy named Mihai. He is absolutely adorable. He is sooo ticklish, and he has the cutest laugh. He has bright blue eyes and blonde hair. He definitely doesn’t look like he is Romanian. It’s so cute because he absolutely loves it when we come. He hates when we leave. The second we go near his crib he freaks out because he knows we are going to leave soon. I just played with him for a while and swang him around. He loved it.

When we got home I cooked dinner because I didn’t get to last week. I made stuffed French toast and fruit salad. Annie showed me how to make the stuffed French toast and boy oh boy it was delicious. I’m so excited to make food when I get home. I’m learning so many cooking skills it’s great.

For FHE Mary was in charge of the activity, and we played a quick game of charades. We were laughing because every time we thought a word would be hard to act out it was guessed immediately. It was fun though. Everyone had a good time.

The rest of the evening I cleaned dishes from dinner, wrote in my journal and organized pictures. Oh there are never enough hours in the day for everything.

My Final Goodbye to Andrei...

This is how Andrei decided to pose for our final picture together...haha...my little monkey.

Last day with Andrei...

Right after I said goodbye to Andrei...these were the gifts I left with him.

The Branch!

Around the Orphanage!

Alex's Birthday party!

Andrei, Cristi and Andrea...my little orphan angels...

Sitting outside with Maria in my lap and the other girls and their kiddos...

Alex swimming on his back...

The Light of my LIFE! My ANDREI!

tickle...tickle...

Classic Andrei pose...such a little stinker...

Can't Get Enough of the Babes in the Hospital!

A little bit of heaven...

The most gorgeous eyelashes you've ever seen...

I'm in love...

This is the little baby that would copy my laugh every time I laughed... such a cutie!

The Black Sea Adventure

I'm pretty sure this is the best picture we took on the trip...

Mindy and I...

Whitney S. and I laying out...

The GANG!

Burying Kenz...

Elyse carrying the umbrella on the way to the beach...

Right before the banana boat ride!

Putting our gear on for the Banana Boat ride!

No turning back...

We are off...

Burying Mindy...

Hospital Fun!

Mihai! Our little angel.

Yes there is some pink in my hair...

The poor thing did not feel well at all.

Kristi! One of our kids at the orphanage with cerebral palsy. He had to go to the hospital for some treatments.

Andreiseni...A Little Bit of Heaven on Earth

Time for bed!

Sleeping under the stars...

We love horses oh yes we do!

Our little cup of honey to eat from the bee man.

MacKenzie's belly after our fifth feeding...we all felt that way...

Any more food anyone?

The old man who sat across from us at the ceremony...he was adorable.

Flowers we were given by one of the families.

We're about to be fed...again...

All the houses have grapevines that line the ceiling when you go to enter their homes...

The librarian who kept giving us gifts!

I caught a baby duck! I was so excited!

The family that grows vegetables in the town.

The beauty of the lake...

The bee man!

One of the houses we dropped by. We were warmly welcomed.

Andrei and his foster mom.

The Monasteries...

Our professor Dave came for a visit. We tried to pick him up for a cool picture. It didn't work.

The beauty...

GORGEOUS

A reservation we stopped by...I shared my apple with a baby deer.

Mario our Romanian Liason. She is great!

Annie's 20th Birthday!

Under the pavillion...

Annie holding the necklace I got her from Krakow...

The most disturbing display of dead goats in the park we have ever seen...it was sick...only in Romania.

GIRLS JUST WANT TO HAVE FUN

Our jumping picture...good times...

Whitney S. and I hit legs while we were jumping...

The pyramid...

Reenacting Annie's Drawing!

I was trying to make sure their poses were just right...

This was the black and white picture we took in order to reenact the drawing Annie drew...

Color version....

Our Birthday Girl!

Whitney S.

An amazing pic of Mindy...haha...I love it!

JULY 4th! I'm PROUD to be an AMERICAN!

The gang...

My roomies...we're all dressed in red, white and blue!

Picnic time...

Balloon Toss!

I just got a piece of ice down Annie's pants...haha...poor thing...

MacKenzie just got ice down my pants...

Water fun...good times..

This is the face of Elder Armstrong who just had a bag of ice water thrown on him...

Good times at the Hospital!

I put a fake tatoo on Marius...

We couldn't get her bed side to go down all the way - so I jumped in and played with Alexandra - she recently had another surgery...

Auschwitz and the Holocaust...

Entrance to Auschwitz...we didn't take pics inside out of respect for those who died...

Birkenau...a few miles away from Auschwitz...

Housing...if you could call it that...

Drawing done by children in one of the blocks...

Each block had line after line of this type of bedding...each slot fit four to five people to a bed...

The restrooms in each block...

Pond memorial where the ashes were put after the bodies were burned...

Rubble of the crematorium that was blown up by the Nazis to cover up any evidence of their wrong doings...

Krakow, Poland

We had fun building a pyramid in the courtyard of the Wawel Castle...

Medieval Square!

Our sillly side...

We kept getting lost...but we always found our way!

Feeding the birds in Medieval Square...

My blue bike with a horn! I love that little horn...

Can't tell it's a rental bike huh?....

A little rest from bike riding!

We decided to rent bikes for a few hours and ride around Poland...so fun...

We love our ice cream soo...

Running around...

The girls...

A giant head in Medieval Square...

Whitney Scott decided we each needed an individual photo shoot along the Wawel Castle wall...

My FAVORITE CITY! BUDAPEST...

Yes this picture is real...

So gorgeous it takes your breath away...

Parliament Building! GORGEOUS!

We love chocolate crepes oh yes we do!

Monument to Hungarian Jews that died in the Holocaust...

Ironically I ran into Truman Hunt (CEO of Nu Skin) and Scott Schwerdt (President of Americas and Europe at Nu Skin) when I went to church in Budapest...For those of you who don't know I worked at Nu Skin for over a year, and I was treated very well by the company....What a small world.

Shopping on the bridge...sooooo fun!

On our way home...wornout and sunburned...

The most gorgeous waterfall ever...outside the castle...

The city I love!

Heros' circle...

The castle...

Try saying this word five times fast...haha...

Good ol' sleeper trains...

Largest Jewish synagogue in Europe...

We're soo crazy...

Even on vacation church is a good thing to attend...

SCABIES!!!!!!!!

The night we found out we had scabies we had to take a shower, put the ointment on, then sleep in our outfit that we were wearing the next day...then we had to do it all over again the next day...DANG SCABIES...

Annie and I had fun being dramatic in this picture...

Cream to the rescue!

The Hospital...

Marion....can you say adorable!

Marius giving me a kiss on the cheek after a rough game of arm wrestling...

My Orange Hair...

I was feeling a bit nervous...if only I knew what the outcome was going to be...

This was my hair right after I dyed it...it has now faded (thank goodness) back to a golden blonde...yes - everyone have a good laugh...P.S. Mom I need you to set me up a hair appointment for the day I get home...thank you.

Marion's Funeral...

Picnic with the Priest and Mayor

I felt like I was in a fairy tale!

The priest...

The mayor (left) and a friend (right)...

Oh my Claudio!

My Claudio laughing!

Kenz and I at the hospital...

Dinner with the Moldova Boys

The Hospital

Florine our little trickster...

Alexandra...so adorable! She has been in the hospital for months. She has had several surgeries on her feet.

The gang on the 6th floor...

Claudio...the lost little boy on the 7th floor...

Our little Marion from the orphanage...he needs a kidney transplant desperately or he won't make it...

The lovely hospital floors...

Melissa's Birthday!

This is my favorite pic of Melissa...haha...

Picnic Time!

After a long game of Ultimate Frisbee...

Elyse and Mindy...oh the joy.

My friend Sera and I.

I hand sewed this skirt and wore it to church! I was soooo proud of myself!

Annie made a skirt too...we had to take a pic...

Night on the town....

Mamma Mia Steak House

A bunch of people were handing out flowers in an effort to get final votes for some politician...we didn't vote, but we did have fun with the flowers!

The Hospital...continued

Poor thing had the worst fever...

Alexandra and Roxanna...two sisters...so full of energy and love!

Samson...this little boy cries all day for his mom...

Florine our little flirt...he went back home Friday...he will be dearly missed!

My Little Orphan Kids!

MY ANDREI!

Valentina my little vampire...

Maria...she is always full of surprises!

Iulia...

Constantine...

Irina...

Church

Church and our fellow Relief Society Members!

My Roomies!

SCARY!

This is written all over in our apartment building...guys aren't real respectful of women here.

More Babies!

We found more babies without moms to love...they were hiding from us on a floor we never go to...

He kept falling asleep while I was feeding him...

Annie was blowing on the babies neck...there is NO air conditioning in the hospital and they bundle the kids up. Everytime we pick them up they are drenched in sweat...poor things!

THE HOSPITAL

My sweetheart...the poor thing is a boy, and they dressed him in pink.

Poor thing...everytime he coughs her entire face turns purple.

Our little Octavian!

MacKenzie tried asking the nurse this orphans name and they said "he's an orphan he doesn't have one..." We decided this was too sad so we named him Octavian.

This baby was a newborn orphan. So tiny...The poor thing is having heart surgery soon...

I was blowing on her stomach...she got a kick out of it!

Our little angel...except we call her grumpy because sometimes she doesn't like to smile - but when she does she lights up the room!

Florine and I...he's such a little ladies man!

Countryside of Romania

City of Brashov

Brashov

Mindy and I in the town square of Brashov!

At the Hostel!

Mindy got the bottom bunk, and I got the top...so fun!

The ENTIRE gang at the hostel...

We love each other!

Peles Castle

Can you say GORGEOUS?

I look like I'm in pain...

Dracula's Castle

Part of the gang!

Vlad the Impaler's Castle

The Cemetery and the Old Man

The old man...

The PIATA...it's like an underground market place where everyone brings their fresh fruit and vegetables to sell...it's our favorite place to go so far.

THE CITY OF IASI

View Outside Our Window...

Although you don't see a lot of grass in the city...you can tell it's very green here...I can't wait to see the country side!!

These are the apartments in Iasi...buildings like these cover the city...

A gypsy girl came up and asked us for a banana for her baby brother...we gave one to her - but you have to be careful because more will come and beg you for food.

A gypsy family...you see them walking around sometimes...however, they are discriminated against by the Romanians greatly.

Us girls needed some CHOCOLATE...gogosi is amazing here...it's like an inverted donut. We can't eat too much of these though or we are going to come back weighing a thousand pounds.

Cultural Palace continued...

The Cultural Palace...just down the street from where we live...absolutely gorgeous!

The city wasn't designed to have parking spots...so cars park everywhere...including the sidewalks. The drivers are a little crazy. They don't really follow the the driving laws - then again maybe they don't have any?

The rain loves us!

Embrace the RAIN!

Water in my shoe after the first Sunday...nice...

The Last GIRLS' Night!

Aunt Courtney and me....isn't she simply radiant!

My Mom and Aunt Ariane...but she's like my sister...

The COUNTDOWN begins...

My Attempt to Pack...

I think I need to reorganize...or cut back on the amount of clothes I'm taking...

Such a homemaker...these scrubs will be my best friend in Romania!

Toys for the children!

Whitney's Favorite Quotes

"No individual has the right to come into the world or go out of it, without leaving behind him distinct and legitimate reasons for having passed through it." - George Washington Carver

"Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres."~ 1 Corinthians 13:4-7 ~

"The only things in life you regret, are the risks you didn't take."

"How wonderful it is that nobody need wait a single moment before starting to improve the world." - Anne Frank